


Daycation

by donniedont



Category: Tiger & Bunny
Genre: Beaches, Fluff, M/M, Vacation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-02
Updated: 2012-12-02
Packaged: 2017-11-20 02:00:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/580050
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/donniedont/pseuds/donniedont
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kotetsu is able to convince Barnaby to go to the beach on a day off.  Kaede comes along and Barnaby finds himself more invested in helping Kotetsu be a parent.  Based around the prompt "a day at the beach."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Daycation

**Author's Note:**

> This was a prompt given to me by my roommate via Tumblr. I sat down and was able to write this. It's super cold where I'm from now, but it was nice to think about warmer weather when writing this!

            Barnaby had one memory about the beach.

 

            It was from back when he was at the Hero Academy.  He was somehow convinced by his classmates that it would be a great time. 

 

            He spent the entire car ride back from the beach attempting to adjust himself without irritating his sun burn.  Apparently, no one felt the need to wake him up while he was napping in the sun.

 

            But when Lloyds demanded that the duo took a day off (not because of Kotetsu’s power lowering to fifty-two seconds, no, not at all), he didn’t argue when the beach was proposed, nor did he disagree when Kotetsu promptly invited Kaede. 

 

            The next day, Barnaby found himself sitting in Kotetsu’s old clunker of a minivan with Kaede in the backseat, banging her hands on her knees as she listened to music too-loud on her ear phones.  He winced every time Kotetsu attempted to carry out a conversation with her, which always resulted in her responding with ten second delays due to her pausing her music, taking out her earphones, and asking him to repeat the question.

 

            They entered the town the beach was located in and Barnaby propped his arm on the door and leaned into it, reading signs.  Everything had a seaside motif—hotels were named after starfish and diners were named after sand dollars.  Signs had shells and ocean waves framing them. 

 

            “Hey, Bunny?” Kotetsu asked, waving his hand.

 

            Barnaby tilted his head toward him.

 

            “Grab the bag right behind your chair.  I got sunscreen in there for you.”

 

            Barnaby raised his eyebrows.  “I didn’t even ask…” he started, until he smiled.  “…of course.”  He grabbed the bag from behind his seat and found a bottle.

 

            “Kaede told me this kind won’t make your skin as greasy,” Kotetsu added.

 

            Barnaby craned his neck to see Kaede still tapping away to her music.  He assumed the excursion resulted in many dramatic sighs and eyerolls on Kaede’s part. 

 

            The closer they got to the shoreline and were welcomed to slow traffic.  Kotetsu responded with hand gestures, Barnaby reacted with putting his hand instinctively on the wheel, and Kaede finally stopped listening to her music to keep trying to tell her father to calm down.  They found a spot in the parking lot, unloaded the trunk, and made their way to the beach.

 

            “Where should we go?” Kotetsu asked, scanning shoreline.

 

            “Don’t ask me,” Barnaby muttered.

 

            “Let’s get as close to the water as possible!” Kaede exclaimed.  She adjusted the bag on her shoulder and brought her chair closer to her as she marched into the throng of umbrellas.

 

            “Kaede, wait up!” Kotetsu yelped, trailing behind her.

 

            Barnaby made sure that all the pieces of their umbrella set were together and sprinted his way over to them.

 

            They ended up in a pretty decent spot, not too far from the ocean.  Kotetsu attempted to dig a deep enough hole for the umbrella stands with his hands as Kaede pushed his hands aside to scoop it out with a plastic shovel.  When Barnaby asked to help, they told him to sit down and enjoy himself.

 

            He got about a paragraph into a book before Kotetsu nearly crashed into other visitors, because a gust caught on the umbrella when he opened it.  He quickly caught him, smiled at the women that was nearly maimed, and finished setting up the umbrellas himself.

 

            “I’m going to go into the water, is that okay?” Kaede asked, taking off her shirt and shorts.

 

            “I should probably watch you,” Kotetsu told her.

 

            “Dad.  I’m eleven years old now.  I can go to the water by myself.  Right, Barnaby?”

 

            Barnaby cringed.  “I mean, sure, I think you’ll be fine…”

 

            Kaede grinned and marched toward the ocean.

 

            Barnaby returned to his chair and Kotetsu opened his own right next to him.  Kotetsu slumped dramatically on the chair and brushed his hand against Barnaby’s.  Barnaby grabbed his hand and gripped it.  Kotetsu never felt entirely comfortable touching him in front of Kaede.  It wasn’t that he was hiding it from her.  Kotetsu decided to announce the relationship to her by taking them out to dinner and dramatically announcing that she was going to be seeing Barnaby a lot more from now on.  Maybe he was trying to respect the fact that her celebrity crush was dating her dad.  Barnaby couldn’t be entirely sure.

 

            “You having a good day off?” Kotetsu asked.

 

            “It’s just started,” Barnaby replied, “Give me an hour or two, please.”

 

            Kotetsu smiled and turned to the ocean, trying to scope Kaede out.

 

            “Will you relax?” he asked, “Kaede is going to be fine.  Pretty sure she knows how to swim.”

 

            “Is it sad that I don’t entirely know if she does?”  A broken chuckle escaped his mouth.  He quickly tilted his head away from Barnaby to wipe the corner of his eye.

 

            Barnaby quickly looked down at his toes, attempting to dig a small hole in front of his chair.  “You’re still catching up on a lot of time.  Don’t beat yourself up over it, please.” 

 

            Kotetsu finally turned to him again.  “Yeah, that’s right!  That’s why I gotta make sure I take advantage of every day off to spend time with her!”

 

            Barnaby narrowed his eyes.  “Please spare a few days for me, too…” he mumbled.  He finally let go of his hand and continued to read his book.

 

            After about half an hour, Kaede returned.  Her hair was matted from sea water and her wet ankles had a fine dusting of sand.  She tapped Kotetsu’s shoulder and woke him up. Apparently, he started to nap while Barnaby was caught up in his book.

 

            “Oh, what’s going on, Kaede?” he asked.

 

            “Can I go to the boardwalk?” she said.

 

            “Sure!  We can put our stuff back in the car…”

 

            “You don’t have to!”  She launched toward her father and pressed her hands on his shoulders to keep him in his seat.  “I mean, I want to go with someone.”

 

            Barnaby finally closed his book and craned his neck to listen.

 

            “Did you bump into someone from school?” Kotetsu asked.

 

            Kaede pulled back, nervously tangling her fingers together.  “No, actually… he’s a boy I was talking to when I was in the water.”  She began to twist her entire body, her cheeks turning red.

 

            “You can go,” Barnaby said.

 

            “Wait, Bunny, hang on!” Kotetsu yelped, “Can we at least meet him first?”

 

            “Yes, we should.  But if he seems nice, I don’t see why not.”  He felt the “we” echo through his ears.  He typically allowed Kotetsu to be the parent.  He wouldn’t even know where to begin attempting to discipline a preteen.  When did he consider himself and Kotetsu a unit in any part of Kaede’s life?  He cleared his throat and began to bury his feet as far as he could into the sand.

 

            “Please, Dad?” Kaede asked.

 

            “I mean…” Kotetsu sighed dramatically.  “…sure.  Yeah.  That sounds right.  Bring him over!  Let Papa and Bunny be the judge of this guy!”

 

            Kaede faced Barnaby and mouthed _thank you_ before she dashed back to the ocean to collect her friend.  A few seconds later she returned with a boy following behind her.  He attempted to push back his moppy brown hair as Kaede waved her hand at him.  “Dad, Barnaby, this is Bryce.  Bryce, this is my dad and… his partner.  Barnaby.” 

 

            Bryce nearly did a double take looking at the two of them.  He appeared pretty aware of their identities as Wild Tiger and Barnaby Brooks Jr, but he didn’t seem willing to announce it.  “Uh, hello,” he mumbled.

 

            “He’s the same age as me,” she explained, “He’s got a summer home here with his family, so he knows the area pretty well.  I’ll make sure to have my cell phone with me at all times.  Can we go, please?”

 

            Kotetsu pressed his lips together and appeared as if he was searching for a reason to say no.  Eventually, he said, “Okay.  Just… please keep me updated?  Or keep Bunny updated.  And please be back by three or four, we have a pretty long drive!”

 

            “Have a great time,” Barnaby added.

 

            Kaede grinned.  She put her shorts back on, gave her father a huge hug, then gave Barnaby one as well.  “Thank you!” she exclaimed as she lead Bryce into the crowd.

 

            “Was that the right thing to do?” Kotetsu asked.

 

            Barnaby wanted to respond with “How should I know?” but instead he said, “Yeah.  That was the right thing to do.”

 

            Kotetsu grabbed Barnaby’s hand and brought it to his lips.  He jokingly kissed it and said, “Want to go spy on them?”

 

            Barnaby pulled his hand back and cringed at him.  “Don’t even think about it,” he said flatly, leaning back on his chair and covering his eyes with his book.

 

**end**


End file.
